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Jose Reyes 2.0 Debuts in Coney Island

The 33-year-old former star shortstop says he’s happy to be back, but can he really help the Mets?

Jose Reyes spent nine season with the Mets before leaving as a free agent at the end of the 2011 season. He signed a minor-league deal with New York on Saturday and played in Brooklyn on Sunday.
Photo:
George Napolitano/Brooklyn Cyclones

The pep in Jose Reyes’s step was familiar: He bounced in and out of the batting cages and gracefully gobbled up ground balls. He flashed the fluorescent smile that Mets fans fell in love with 13 years ago.

It all felt recognizable, but plenty has changed in Reyes’s return to the Mets, which began Sunday afternoon with the Single-A Brooklyn Cyclones. He is no longer universally adored the way he once was after a two-month suspension under the league’s domestic violence policy. And he is no longer the superstar that electrified Queens the way few players have in franchise history.

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But it’s this familiarity that led Reyes back to the Mets, and to the franchise giving Reyes another chance in a controversial and complicated reunion.

“The Mets were always going to be the first choice for me,” said Reyes. “I’m home. I’m happy.”

Playing third base, Reyes led off and went 0-for-3 in his return before leaving after six innings. The fans who flocked to MCU Park here in Coney Island applauded his every move and called out the “Jose-Jose-Jose-Jose” cheer that used to echo through Shea Stadium and Citi Field. Within 24 hours of his signing, the Cyclones sold approximately 2,500 additional tickets.

Reyes’s journey back to the Mets after leaving at the end of the 2011 season has taken many stops. He signed a big free-agent contract with the Marlins, who subsequently traded him to Toronto after just one season. Then, midway through 2015, the Blue Jays shipped him to Colorado, where he floundered in 49 games, hitting .259 and raising questions about whether his skills had eroded too much with age to make him a valuable contributor.

Then, last October, he was arrested following an alleged violent incident with his wife, Katherine Ramirez. The case never went to trial because his wife didn't cooperate with prosecutors, but after Major League Baseball conducted an investigation, they suspended Reyes through May under the league’s domestic violence policy.

Reyes repeatedly apologized Sunday for what happened, referring to it as a “big mistake” and saying he is committed to ongoing counseling. His wife was in attendance at Sunday’s game.

“We felt he deserved a second chance and that second chance was most appropriate with us, a place where he spent a lot of his formative years,” general manager Sandy Alderson said Saturday, before he attended the game on Sunday. “I do believe that he is a good person at heart, a good person that made a huge mistake.”

Still, it’s these on- and off-the-field factors that led the Rockies to designate Reyes for assignment this month when faced with the prospect of re-adding him to their major-league roster. And this is why the Mets’ decision to sign him is so complex: While many of the questions about his signing pertain to the domestic violence incident, it’s also not entirely obvious to what extent he’ll resemble the player who holds the Mets’ franchise record for stolen bases and who led the league in batting average in his final year with the team.

“People say I’m going to come in here and going to steal 60 bases, and I’m going to hit 20 triples,” Reyes said. “Let’s not get too crazy. That happened a long time ago.”

Sunday’s hitless performance notwithstanding, there are reasons for the Mets to be optimistic that Reyes can help. Before the Rockies designated him for assignment, he hit .303 with two home runs and three stolen bases in nine Triple-A games.

He also indicated that returning to the place where he spent the first 12 years of his professional career, after the Mets signed him as a 16-year-old out of the Dominican Republic, may help him rediscover some of that former magic.

His agent, Peter Greenberg, said Reyes was so eager to re-sign with the Mets that didn’t sleep for two straight nights before it was made official. The minor-league contract includes a club option so the Mets can keep him next year if they so choose, with the Rockies continuing to pick up almost all of the tab.

At the same time, a plethora of injuries has rendered the Mets’ offense among the weakest in baseball. They are averaging 3.7 runs per game, the third-worst in the league, after Sunday’s 5-2 loss to the Braves—so they’re willing to take a chance that a happy Reyes can jump-start a floundering lineup.

Reyes will likely see the majority of his playing time at third base but will also back up Asdrubal Cabrera at shortstop. Alderson even said Reyes may see some time in the outfield. Reyes said he doesn’t really care where he plays, so long as it’s in a Mets uniform.